


Looking Down the Barrel of Today

by antonomasia09



Category: Killjoys (TV)
Genre: Gen, Learning How To Be Human, New Beginnings, Post-Canon, Yuletide Treat, maybe eventual redemption
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-20
Updated: 2019-12-20
Packaged: 2021-02-26 05:40:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,045
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21868399
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/antonomasia09/pseuds/antonomasia09
Summary: The Lady learns what it is to be human.
Relationships: Dutch | Yalena Yardeen & The Lady
Comments: 15
Kudos: 25
Collections: Yuletide 2019





	Looking Down the Barrel of Today

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lady_ragnell](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lady_ragnell/gifts).



> Happy Yuletide, lady_ragnell! I loved the ideas your letter, and I hope I did at least some of them justice.

Dutch won’t give the Lady updates on the campaign against her children. The Lady has no proper mental connection with them anymore, but she would swear that she can hear their cries as they die, can see their blood drying dark on Dutch’s hands. 

She tries to take pleasure in the bruises on Dutch’s face, the shallow breaths she takes when walking with cracked ribs, the nearly-hidden winces when she moves a limb that’s not quite healed. The deaths of Lady’s children do not come easily.

But Dutch’s pain isn’t nearly enough compensation for the deaths of the hatchlings. And, even worse, sometimes the Lady catches herself wincing along with Dutch, feeling a phantom twinge herself and wishing she could make it go away.

“It’s called empathy,” Dutch tells her. “It’s a human trait. I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised that you have it; even I do, in spite of Khlyen’s best attempts to train it out of me.”

Dutch won’t give her updates on Khlyen either. It’s rare for her to even speak his name. The Lady is starting to think she understands why, but she can’t stop asking.

“I hate it,” she says. “You deserve to suffer.”

“I used to think that,” Dutch says. “Still do, occasionally. But I can’t change my past, only learn from it. And I refuse to feel remorse for killing something that wants to destroy me and everyone I love.”

The Lady crosses her arms and turns away, and after a few minutes she can hear Dutch sigh as she stands up carefully and leaves the cube, its wall rippling in her wake.

***

Sometimes, when Dutch comes to visit, she isn’t alone.

“She said she’d kill me if I killed you,” Fancy tells the Lady. “I thought about doing it anyway.”

Of course he did. He’s terrified of her — that’s obvious — and rightfully so. She may not be able to physically pull his strings anymore, but there are a million ways to control someone. 

“What are you doing here, then, if not to kill me?” she says.

“I don’t know. Proving to myself that you’re not a threat, I guess.”

She may be human now, but she still knows how to make her screams pierce and resonate enough to make ears bleed. She spent a week in a muzzle after she did it to Dutch, and doesn’t particularly care to repeat that experience, but she’s on her feet anyway, fists clenched and mouth open when Dutch steps between them.

“You said you wouldn’t antagonize her,” Dutch says to Fancy.

“If I told you I was going to antagonize her, you wouldn’t have let me in,” he says.

The Lady hisses. “I know everything there is to know about you, Fancy Lee,” she sneers. “Your greatest fears, every carefully-hidden weakness. Even here, with nothing, I can destroy you.”

Dutch cuts her an annoyed glance. “You’re not helping,” she says, and blocks Fancy with a grunt when he tries to lunge at the Lady.

“That’s it,” Dutch decides. “Come on.” She grabs Fancy by the collar of his shirt and drags him backwards out of the cube, then reappears a moment later.

“Sorry about that,” she says. “He told me he had tactical questions for you, and I owed him a favor.”

The Lady raises her chin. “I wouldn’t have answered his questions,” she says.

“I know,” Dutch says. “I thought it might help him anyway. I wouldn’t have let either of you get hurt.”

“I’m your enemy,” the Lady says. “Your prisoner of war.”

“You don’t have to be,” Dutch says. “You’re not Hullen anymore. We’ve accepted the Cleansed back; who’s to say we can’t do the same for you?”

It’s a ridiculous thought. The Lady, living a quiet, ordinary, _human_ life amongst the people she attempted to annihilate. What would she even do? Operate a bar? If that is what she has to look forward to, she’s not sure she ever wants to leave her prison.

“Ask Fancy Lee what he thinks about that idea,” she says.

***

The Lady knows what the red boxes meant to Dutch; all of those memories are still in her head, along with Aneela’s and thousands of others’. Sometimes, she wonders how they all fit inside her tiny human skull; sometimes, she’s convinced that they don’t, and she can practically feel them bleeding out of her brain to swirl around the cube.

Still, every time Dutch brings rewards for the Lady’s good behavior — books or shiny harmless trinkets or sweets that coat her tongue with rich flavors — they come in a red box. The Lady is aware that she’s being conditioned, but she can’t stop the thrill she feels when she sees Dutch carrying one. She piles them in the corner, and sometimes she likes to run her fingers over their smooth varnish, or draw patterns in the satin lining their interiors.

“Where are you getting the boxes from?” she asks Dutch, once. “Did you keep all of the ones that Khlyen gave you?”

“Yes,” Dutch says, and the Lady daydreams for a moment about what weapon this latest box had held before, and whose life that weapon took.

“Why are you giving them to me?” she asks.

“Because I’m not like him,” Dutch answers. The Lady doesn’t think that’s exactly true, but she doesn’t try to argue.

***

“I’m not going to just give you a name,” Dutch tells her.

“Why not?” the Lady asks. “Weren’t yours given to you by your sister and your Jaqobis?”

“Yes,” Dutch admits. “But I didn’t ask for them. I earned them.”

“I hardly see how you earned the name ‘Yalena,’” the Lady protests, and Dutch rolls her eyes.

“If you want a name so badly, pick one yourself,” Dutch says. “Who do you want to be?”

“I…” the Lady hesitates. There are so many things that she has been. _Scourge, conquerer, omnipotent, mother_. Things she has wanted to be: _daughter, loved, complete_. 

Things she is now. _Human, weak, pathetic, lonely, bored._ But what will she be? What does she _want_ to be?

“Think about it,” Dutch says, her voice gentle. “You have time.”

The Lady nods and absently strokes the hair of the doll Dutch gave her. They sit together in silence for a long time.


End file.
